


It's not the fall that kills you, but it's worth a try

by thebirdsandtheboxes



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: A journey into the vast, Avatar of the vast, Freeform, Gen, It's not that graphic but it's still quite explicit, OC, Statement, Statement about the vast, Suicide by jumping from high places, TW discussion of suicide, TW mention of suicide, TW suicidal thoughts/ mention of such, VAST, mention of depression and anxiety (like in one sentence)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:01:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26568469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebirdsandtheboxes/pseuds/thebirdsandtheboxes
Summary: Statement of a person becoming an avatar of the vast.
Comments: 7
Kudos: 5





	It's not the fall that kills you, but it's worth a try

**Author's Note:**

> I talk a lot about suicide and falling/jumping off high places in this. So please be careful if anything like that triggers you.   
> (I put trigger warnings in the taggs)   
> If I missed any, I apoogize and please tell me. (I genuinely don't want to fuck ayone up with this)
> 
> Besides all that: enjoy, I guess.

Statement of Mars Weber regarding their journey of getting too close to the Vast.   
Statement recorded directly from subject, October 23 2018.

Statement begins;

I don't remember when heights started to enthral me so much. Maybe it had always been in me. The thrill of looking over an edge. The freedom of falling, before you hit the ground. Those small weightless moments when you're unsure if you'll be good or not, but all you can do is wait and fall and see. Jumping down a few steps too many at the bottom of a staircase. Jumping off a swing set. Jumping down a wall you sat on.  
I basically sought these little moments out. Not consciously at first.  
But there was not a staircase I wouldn’t jump down the last few steps. And there was not an edge I passed up on balancing on. Even once I was far too old to do that.

Then a friend of my parents committed suicide. He jumped of a bridge. One of those motorway ones. Real high one.   
My first thought was, yea that'll do it. I felt bad about thinking that.

We passed that bridge a lot, both under and over. It was right on our way to the nearest city. We drove by it often and every time we passed it I thought of jumping, falling and landing. That long fall down from the bridge to the grass below.  
My thoughts became more morbid with each time we passed the bridge.  
What would a body look like that hit the grass, having fallen from that high up?   
Who would find it or what remains of it?   
What do bodies sound like when they land?  
Would you hear it just before you stop living?  
What would it feel like to have your body meet the ground with the force of a fall like that?

I once heard that a lot of people regretted jumping once they did, at least the survivors of such jumps reported that once they were in the air they desperately wanted not to be. Once they’d made the decision they couldn’t go back and the overbearing powerlessness they’d felt when they had been out in the air had been one of the worst fears they’d ever felt.  
I wondered if I would regret it. If I would feel the power that comes with gravity pulling me to the ground below and wish I’d made different choices. Or if I would just wish the feeling of falling could last just a bit longer.

That was probably the first time I thought about jumping.

A few years later, I wasn't living with my parents anymore, I got very bad anxiety and depression and suicidal thoughts right along with it.  
And it was always jumping. When I thought of ending it all, I wanted it to be through falling.   
Because what a way to go out.

It had a bit of a mind of its own, the urge to jump. Any time I was close to anything that could be jumped down there was an urge. Like a force pulling me to jump.  
It was almost like I could know how it would be to climb on to the ledge of the window and push my body far away from the house, to jump into the open space. That short time of falling, of being free, of feeling l the air around me, before the earth would inevitably catch up with me.

I never did, I was still sane enough to know my family would be crushed and I'd just have to wait for it to get better.  
It did. The urge to end it all left.  
The urge to jump didn't. It stayed just less strong but ever present.

In addition to that, a different experience emerged. I would imagine falling, anywhere. There didn't have to be anywhere to fall to.  
I would imagine the floor opening up and me falling down. It wouldn't swallow me, it'd just be gone. And I would fall. It was all I could do not to let the feeling of artificial vertigo overtake me.

These two constant companions would be with me through the next few years.  
I never told anyone. The first one was only a few intrusive thoughts concentrated on edges, it was nothing to be too concerned about, and the other one seemed to be somewhat of a coping mechanism even. A way to take me out of a situation that overwhelmed me.  
So both were easily manageable. 

That was until I went on a vacation to the coast.  
It was my first vacation all by myself and I decided to visit a lighthouse.  
I'd always liked them and while I did tend to get dizzy on the stairs winding themselves through its interior, it was worth it to have the view from above.

When I stood there, up on the top of the lighthouse, on the railing, I couldn't focus on the beautiful view of the dunes and the sea. All I could think of was the ground below and the distance between the edge of the lighthouse and sandy dunes it stood on.  
How long would it take me to fall down there? It couldn't be that long. It wasn't too high.  
Would it even be worth it, falling down there?  
All of my attention was on the jump, the fall, the landing.

I got a bit freaked out by that so I made my way down the lighthouse again quite soon. The edge was secured of course, I wouldn't have been able to jump down even if I'd wanted to.  
But just the very strong urge was scary.

Here's the thing about the stairs in lighthouses. In addition to being in a circular motion most of the time, the steps are fairly slim, so even my descent from the top all I could think off was how I could slip or misstep or lose my balance and fall at any time.  
I made it down safely. 

But for the rest of the vacation I found myself searching out almost any high place I could find in and around town.  
Viewpoints, windmills, museums that were taller than two stories, other lighthouses. Even tall ships were on that list. 

If I didn’t find myself on high spaces the artificial vertigo was often unbearable. Before I had created it willingly, but now it just came on by itself. And it drove me to the high places even more. 

I'd go to the highest points that were available to the public and just stand by the edge, thinking of jumping, falling and landing.  
I'd always get down the traditional way again. Stairs or elevators. I didn't give in just yet.

When I got back I thought about that feeling of standing by a ledge every time I saw a building that was tall enough that looking down from it would trigger that feeling. 

The following months I learned how easy it actually was to get into office buildings and to the top of them. I spent far too much time standing on the edges of buildings. 

Around that time my dreams changed. I’m not going to pretend like it was some supernatural force manipulating me in my sleep. I have always stress dreamed very vividly and falling in dreams isn’t particularly unique. Every night I would dream of falling. Just those dreams where you run away from something and then you’re on an edge and you have to jump and you fall and just before you hit the ground you wake up. They were normal dreams, they were just very frequently. 

I barely dreamed of anything else. I didn’t sleep through a lot of nights. Usually I’d wake up in the middle of the night just before hitting the ground in my dream. The lack of good night sleep wore on me.

The next time I visited my parents, my mother gave me a voucher for a paraglideing flight. She’d had gotten it as a birthday present a while back but due to an injury to her spine she couldn’t use it anymore. 

So that spring I stood on a hillside, strapped to a person and a very large piece of nylon fabric. They lifted us off the ground and I was in the air. It wasn’t free fall. I wasn’t by myself and I wasn’t in control. But I was in the air. No ground under my feet, only sky all around me. It was an elevating feeling. All I felt was the wind. 

And if I’d thought the feeling of standing at an edge was exhilarating, this was so much more. This was almost too much for my mind to take. And as we approached the ground it just got better and better. I almost felt like I was falling. Like I would actually experience what it would feel like to fall and meet the ground. This hadn’t really given me the jump but maybe the fall and the landing could be close to what I’d imagined.

When we landed I was almost disappointed about the soft landing. That my tandem flight instructor set their feet on the ground first. That I couldn’t feel the full force of the ground after the fall. I didn’t feel the landing. I felt cheated. It had been exhilarating, but I wanted so much more.

After that the urge for the jump and the fall and the landing just got stronger. I spend almost every moment felling that artificial falling feeling. It felt like I was just longing to be falling by that point. Every time I saw something tall, I longed to climb up and jump down. Any time I walked across a bridge, the edge called to me. 

It took longer than you might expect from someone who’s every waking thoughts were consumed by falling to actually jump. 

It was in summer, you probably know how hot the city gets. I hadn’t slept properly for days because of the heat and the dreams, so I was delirious. It was the middle of the night and I hadn’t even gone to sleep yet. I had tried but my thoughts had been restless. I went for a walk, to clear my head, to get some fresh air, to do anything but scroll through social media apps for hours or lay awake in agony. 

The streets were bright, of course, it never gets truly dark in a city. But in midst of all of the nightly lights, there was one very tall building that was completely alight. Every window was bright. 

As a child I had a view of a building that looked a lot like this one, that would always be fully lit up at night and I loved looking at it so much. So the view enchanted me. 

I barely made the conscious choice to go to it. I was like a moth drawn to the flame. My experiences of finding my way into and to the roof of large buildings helped immensely and in no time I stood on top of the building. 

If you’ve ever stood at a high point in a city at night you know how mesmerizing the view is. It’s an ocean of lights spread out before you. It’s one of the most beautiful things you can look at if you ask me. Right along with the night sky and the ocean. But maybe I just have a predisposition for finding things beautiful that remind me of how small I am. 

Then I looked down. I didn’t know exactly what kind of building I stood on top of, it might have been an office or a hotel but it was pretty high. And the street below was small and only dimly lit. 

I was reminded of a dozen scenes from Spiderman movies and comics. Standing on top of the city, looking down and being filled with this exhilaration and fear and excitement. I don’t know what pushed me in the end. But I could feel the adrenalin start in my head and fill the rest of me and then I took just a few steps back and started running and jumped. 

It was an amazing feeling. My feet pushing me over the edge, Feeling the strength of the jump and the freedom of being in the air. Seeing the empty space below me. And then there was the very short moment of weightlessness, when my jumping force was met with gravity. I think that is what freedom feels like. And then gravity won and I fell towards the ground. The building racing past me was a perspective I enjoyed, if only for a very short while. The air rushing past me cleared my head like nothing else. I was spinning and tumbling, I had no idea how to properly control my body in free fall, but even if it wasn’t as perfect as it might be in a Ghibli movie, it was amazing nonetheless. Then the ground met me. My body hit the earth with the force of gravity and my body weight added together. I won’t lie, it hurt like hell. But man was it satisfying. This was the kind of impact that was meant to follow a jump and a fall like that. 

To my surprise I didn’t die though. Don’t ask me how, I don’t have an answer for you. I basked in the feeling of the concrete below me for a second but then I got up. I did some stretches and I was good to go. 

I can tell you I slept really well that night. Nothing to clear your head like falling of a building. 

The next day I went back to where I had landed. There was a dark spot on the ground, but it didn’t look any more concerning than any other dark spot on the pavement. 

I was concerned by what had happened the night before, of course. I had jumped from a building and I had survived it. I could have just tried to convince myself that I had imagined it. That it had been a dream. But I knew it hadn’t. 

And I didn’t want it to be. I wanted it to be real and I wanted to do it again. 

And I did. I climbed about any high building in the city and jumped down. I jumped off any bridge and edge. It was amazing every single time. The jump the fall and the landing were as exhilarating as the first time. 

At first I was very careful with it. Made sure as few people as possible saw me. But after a while I got sloppier and then one day a whole group of people saw me hit the ground. I heard their gasps and screams as the ground welcomed me. And man was that a fun feeling. Letting people know of my new habit. I had kept it from my family and friends. Of course I had. They’d think me crazy or a monster if I showed them. But having people witness it was amazing. See their shocked expressions and their puzzlement as I peeled myself of the ground and walked away. Their second wave of gasps and screams was almost better than the first. 

I kept it going, and it was fun at first, scaring groups of people by landing in front of them, but soon I found out the far more exciting thing was to throw myself off of tourist platforms. Somewhere where a lot of people stood at the top and would see me fall. They’d cry out and scramble to stop me and when they couldn’t they’d call authorities and call for anyone to help the poor thing that had thrown themselves off the edge. 

By the time the police or park service or whoever was responsible in the place would arrive at my landing site I had picked myself off the ground and left the scene. Sometimes I’d buy myself a disguise in the gift shop and stay for the aftermath. 

A whole group of tourists claiming to have seen someone leap to their death was hard to excuse. But the landing spot would barely have enough blood on it to merit a visit to the hospital for whoever had lost it. It was terribly fun to watch them scramble and fret about the situation. 

Once I even made it into one of those podcasts about supernatural cases. The case of the missing corpse. It was really fun to listen to. A shop clerk at one of my jumping points told me about it. 

He was probably the closest I’d had to a proper friend for a while. Mostly because he had made the connection. I was at the place he worked at a lot and so was he. It was only a matter of time before someone caught up on it. He was cool about it. He was under payed and tired, so the worst he did was try to get me to leave. I was bad for business, he said and he was probably right. But I really liked him, he was basically the only person who knew at least a fraction of what I could do. And he wasn’t scared which was really nice. Eventually he threw himself off the place I had jumped down so many times myself. I was almost sad when I found his body at the bottom. What a pitiful end, dying at your shitty job. But something stirred in me right then. Knowing I had probably been the reason for him to give in to the temptation of the edge was strangely exciting. 

I changed my jumping spots after some time. The thrill of sharing the draw of the fall had been better than shocking some tourists. So I sought that out. I frequented spots that were known for being suicide spots. Bridges at night, office buildings’ roofs. Those kind of places. 

I ran across people more often than not. The thing with suicidal people is, you’re sort of playing a game of chance. My talking to them resulted into them jumping about as often as it resulted into them walking home again. 

I enjoyed the conversations with the people who felt the temptation of the open air either way. I never pushed anyone, not physically at least. That would be cheating. No I talked to them, sometimes for hours. And some of them would jump and some of them wouldn’t. I would jump either way. Sometimes after them, sometimes before and sometimes we’d jump together. 

That’s mostly what I’m doing now. I’ve considered trying skydiving or paragliding, but honestly there’s just too much safety involved. 

For now talking on rooftop to strangers is enough for me. 

Statement ends.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. 
> 
> I hope you liked it.


End file.
